1. Field of the Invention
The present invention relates to an apparatus for controlling power management of a DSP (Digital Signal Processor) and a power management system and method using the same; and, more particularly, to an apparatus for controlling power management of a DSP, which controls dynamic power consumption and static power consumption in the DSP in modules, which are fine, so as to reduce overall power consumption, and a power management system and method using the same.
This work was supported by the Information Technology (IT) research and development program of the Korean Ministry of Information and Communication (MIC) and the Korean Institute for Information Technology Advancement (IITA) [2006-S-048-01, “Embedded DSP Platform for Audio/Video Signal Processing”].
2. Description of Related Art
Recently, a high capacity digital signal processing function has been required for mobile communication systems and digital multimedia equipment. Thus, in order to efficiently process such a high capacity operation, most of equipments employ an embedded DSP.
Further, as various home appliances used in daily life, as well as modern advanced equipments, are becoming more diversified and complicated in their functions, the demand for DSPs is increasing.
DSPs mounted in these equipments require much power because they have to process a high capacity operation. Accordingly, schemes for reducing power consumption are being an issue. Especially, in mobile equipments, the low power problem of the embedded digital signal processor is known as one of the most important problems.
Further, since recent digital multimedia terminals have to support a variety of applications, the embedded DSP also has to process a variety of application programs.
At this time, by taking into account that there is a large difference in the scope of resources required in accordance with application programs, the specification of the DSP embedded in a system must meet the specification required by an application program having the highest complexity among the programs that have to be executed in the DSP.
Therefore, when a program having a low complexity is executed in the DSP having such a high specification, this is not efficient because unnecessary resources of the DSP have to consume power.
To overcome this, a conventional DSP employs commands for reducing power consumption, such as an IDLE command, and has the control function capable of reducing power consumption in several steps depending on an operating state.
That is to say, the conventional DSP has a dynamic type that reduces power consumption by controlling clocks for a core unit, a peripheral unit, and a memory unit as an application program in execution finishes the operation within a preset period of time. Thus, such a conventional DSP cannot perform power control in modules, which are finer than units, and cannot also support a static type that controls power itself, thus failing to efficiently reduce power consumption.
Especially, when considering that static power consumption is becoming gradually important as compared to dynamic power consumption as a recent semiconductor process becomes finer into nano unit, power control in modules (blocks), which is finer, is essentially required.